Kolkata Tigers clinch thriller against Champs

The fourth match of the Edelweiss 20s Challenge being played at Tau Devi Lal Stadium Sector-3, Panchkula featured the Mumbai Champs taking on the spirited Kolkata Tigers from the city of joy. The pitch report had the experts declare the pitch as dry with low bounce.

Craig Mcmillan, the Tigers captain won the toss and elected to bat. The Tigers won the thriller by 2 runs handing the Mumbai Champs their second straight defeat in the Edelweiss 20s Challenge. Andre Adams was declared Man of the Match for his all round performance.

The Tigers opened the innings with Subhomoy Das & the great Lance Klusener. Das got into the act right away sending the ball to the ropes twice in the first over of Van der Wath. Tino best got the first break with a fast delivery castling Lance Klusener in the 4th over for 9. At the end of the fifth over the Tigers were placed at 35 /1. Astle brought on medium pacer Khird in the 7th over and he responded with a wicket on the first ball getting Subhomoy Das for 21.

Kasprowicz who was hit for a couple of boundaries in his previous over got right back into the game clean bowling the dangerous Tigers captain MCmillan in the 10th over. By the end of the 10th over the match was a keen contest between the bat & the ball, with the Tigers placed at 67/3.

The promising Jhunjhunwala was looking good in the company of the experienced Rohan Gavaskar, till a rush of blood saw him getting out to a smart piece of stumping by Paul of the impressive bowling of Khirid in the 14th over.

At the end of the 15th over the tigers were placed at 102/4. Rohan Gavaskar was the mainstay of the Tigers batting, but the boundaries were hard to come by. The hard hitting Andre Adams came to the party clubbing two big sixes of the final Tino Best over. The Tigers innings finally folded at 146/5 in 20 overs.

The Mumbai Champs reply started on a shaky note with Jayanta castled by Andre Adams in the first over. The newly promoted opener S Paul along with Raviraj Patil were in a positive mood displaying an array of strokes taking the score to 34/1 at the end of the 4th over . Patil especially was in an aggressive mood showing scant respect for the reputed opposition bowlers, stroking some audacious strokes all across the park.

The courageous partnership came to an end when the Tigers captain got the dangerous Patil out for a well made 52 in the 10th over. At the 11th over the Champs were well placed at 87/2 with captain Nathan Astle & Paul battling it out for the Champs at the crease. Some tight overs in the middle of the innings from the experienced Klusener & Mcmillan brought the tigers back into the game.

At the end of the 15th over the Champs were placed at 102/3, needing 45 off the last 5 overs at 9 runs per over. Astle played some big shots but a rash stroke brought an end to his promising innings of 30, which changed the fortunes for Champs.

A mini collapse with quick wickets of Van der Wath & Powar & Khanolkar reduced the Champs to 130 /6 in the 17th over taking the match right down to the wire . The Champs needed 9 runs off the last over from the quick Hayward. It proved too big a task for the lower order batsmen & finally the champs fell short of the target by 2 runs.

Brief scores: Kolkata Tigers (146/5 , R Gavaskar 41, A Jhunjhunwala 33, A Adams 21 , R Khirid 17/2 ) won by 2 runs , Mumbai Champs ( 144/9 R Patil 52, N Astle 30, A Adams 3/35 )

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